A lot of this influence comes from the fact that cinema is generally regarded as a social activity, and even as a ‘social integrator’, as claimed in Jowett and Linton’s theory that cinema-going is a way of signalling that the individual is not too deviant in cultural activities.
We make a special effort when visiting the cinema; we usually make a special journey and have to pay. As we sit in the dark, directly facing the screen, and are perhaps physically separated from our neighbours by armrests, the cinema involves us a lot more and demands a lot more attention than, for example, the television would. By visiting the cinema, therefore, a lot of people are looking for release, separation and escapism. This heightened sense of occasion and higher absorption in the action, as argued by Tudor, could make us more susceptible to the film’s message. Additionally, the fact that people very rarely visit the cinema alone means that they will often discuss the film afterwards. The views of people’s peers can have a significant effect on their own opinions.
However, some argue that the extent to which a film influences us largely depends on why we have gone to the cinema and what kind of film we are going to view. If the film is cognitive, the audience is much more likely to have an open mind about the subject matter and to want to gain knowledge and to think through problems and ideas presented to them. Cognitive films, therefore, could be considered to be more influential than other types. Personal integrative and social integrative films could also be quite influential, in that a viewer may go to see them in order to work through a problem that they may face in real life. However, affective films and those designed to release tension are arguably the least influential, as an audience usually watches these in order to simply be entertained and relax.
For those audience members who are already slightly eccentric, however, films may be too influential and encourage copy-cat behaviour. For example, in the James Bulger case (1993) the judge suggested that the film Child’s Play 3 (1991) may have helped to motivate the killing. This links to Jean Baudry’s theory, which claims that film viewing, because of the darkness of the theatre, the spectator’s passivity and the almost hypnotic flickering of light and shadows, is an artificially regressive state, mimicking dreaming. This means that the audience members slip into a childish version of themselves, in which their wants and desires dominate their personality, at the expense of contextual, ethical and social considerations. Baudry, therefore, suggested that film is a dangerous medium, and that it is unhealthy to expose children to it.
Perhaps a much more obvious effect of films is how they use product placement and influence us into buying merchandise. An audience can quite easily be manipulated into buying merchandise, which will advertise the film to others as well as generating more revenue for the producers. In conclusion, however, it can be argued that films influence audiences in many different ways, but that the extent to which they are influenced depends on the type of film and the type of spectator.
Sources:
Allan Casebier (1991) Film and Phenomenology: toward a realistic theory of cinematic representation Cambridge University Press.
Will Brooker (2003) The Audience Studies Reader Routledge.
Jean Mitry & Christopher King (1997) The Aesthetics and Psychology of the Cinema Indiana University Press.
Liz Cooper - A 22 year old media graduate from northern England, Liz now lives in London where she undertakes freelance television and writing work. A ...
Join the Conversation